You tell your friends how hard it is to be a human and they have no choice but to agree. Years ago, you shrewdly deduced that they were humans, too.

"Too much, it's too much," you message them, and they read the message and write back, "Ugh yes." You mention that you visited another doctor today, and they send electronic hearts and empathetic yellow faces.

This is friendship and there's probably nothing better than it. Good friendship makes true love look like dogshit, you think, but sometimes you see people in love and hope they catch on fire before your eyes.

You try to enter rooms with the gravitas of someone who could pull off saying "I love to have a good time." You try to shake hands firmly and try to wear clothes made from interesting materials. You try to sleep but don't, and even that is very human of you. Humans rarely get the full eight hours, and when they do they tell everyone at work the next day.

When you get home from work you practice putting your hands to your throat. "Ack!" You make choking noises in the dark, and find it's more fun than watching TV.

The doctor tells you that it's hard to pinpoint precisely what's wrong with your joints and your stomach and your skin and your head because the human body is so complicated. But that's okay, he says, because you have a whole lifetime to figure it out. The doctor sends you to a different doctor who tells you the same thing, and you appreciate their consistency. You go online and find dozens of variations on this same diagnosis and dozens more diagnoses you never considered, and you revel at the options presented. Life is stuffed to the gills with fine details.

You meet a friend for dinner. You haven't seen her in several months because you're both so busy being humans. She eats like a bird and you find it endearing, and you eat like a bird in the hopes that she finds you endearing, too. She talks for a very long time about her new boyfriend, who sounds like the last nice guy in the world. When she finishes and asks how you're doing, you look off to the side and say you're sad and have no idea what to do about it. In the silence, you hear forks and knives clashing at neighboring tables.

You apologize, and admit, truthfully, that you have no idea where that came from. She says it's fine, but you hate that you've become the kind of person who ruins dinners. You mention a new superhero movie you think she might like and she agrees it looks very exciting. You drink a full glass of water while she talks.

Back at your apartment, you learn that if you slap your face and laugh at the same time it's easy to recreate the feeling of getting an adrenaline high. You've turned off all the lamps and drawn all the curtains and are forced to shade your eyes with your hand when a new message suddenly lights up your phone.

It's your friend who eats like a bird. She's sent you a link to an article about stretches and deep breathing. You don't open it, and never will. You send back prayer hands and words of gratitude.

"I know it's so much at once," she says. "It sounds so rough. Sometimes we just need to take ourselves out of it."

"YES," you text back. You feel a smile force your mouth open as you type. "YES." You're relieved almost to the point of tears to have finally received some useful advice. It's exactly what you would want to hear if you were in your position.

.